


The Make-Up

by amanda_jolene



Category: My Mad Fat Diary
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Gen, Season 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-21
Updated: 2014-07-21
Packaged: 2018-02-09 20:01:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1995966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amanda_jolene/pseuds/amanda_jolene
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: Something post 2x2 where Rae and Finn make up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Make-Up

They avoid each other. 

It’s not that hard to do. She’s not going to college and the gang is falling apart and no one really sees anyone anymore. Chloe’s hanging around Stacey and Archie’s suddenly a prick in a rugby jersey. Finn’s got Chop and Izzy but even that’s falling apart because Chop loves Finn but he loves Rae, too. 

“She was wrong for breakin’ up with ya,” Chop tells Finn. “But you were just as wrong for telling her ya couldn’t be friends.” 

“You don’t know the situation,” Finn slips his jacket on. “And until you do, mind your fucking business.” 

And he doesn’t see Chop for a while after that. 

He’s floating in a crowd at college full of faces he vaguely knows but doesn’t trust. They all smile and ask how he is, if he’s coming to the party and it’s all terribly wrong. Because on Friday night he should be going to the pub, joking with Chop and Archie, thinking Izzy is an awfully sweet girl, rolling his eyes at Chloe and kissing Rae until he can’t breathe but he can’t stop. But all of that is gone because summer slipped away and took everything he loved with it and he’s mad in a way he can’t explain. It’s like the first time his mum left and everything is raw and he just wants someone to tell him it will be ok but everyone is just smiling like nothing has happened. 

He sees her two weeks after they break up. They pass each other on the street and they both pause. There’s a wealth of things to say and nothing will come out. He swallows once, twice and still nothing. She blinks as if she isn’t sure he’s really there and then something dark (like a shadow he can’t chase away) falls over her face and she’s walking away from him. 

Space, he reminds himself. He wanted space. He was the one who decided they couldn’t be friends. He meant it, too. How could they go back to being just friends when he had felt his world slip and shift under the feel over her lips? How could he sit there and pretend he hadn’t tasted the crook of her neck and didn’t know what the exclamation of her breath felt like on his skin? It wasn’t fair. 

Space. Space. 

He’s trailing her, though, trying to figure out exactly what needs to be said. He’d do anything, whatever she wanted. Friends, maybe he could do friends. Because friends can turn into more, right? Because friends was better than sitting at home, wondering what she was doing and if she’d changed shampoo or if she still wore that green t-shirt he liked so much. Friends, no matter how agonizing it might be, with her would be better than anything he can imagine at the moment because he can’t fake another smile for a group of people he can’t stand. 

He wants Rae back and he doesn’t care how. He wants the gang back. He wants summer back.

She turns around and his throat closes as his voice echoes off the buildings around them. “I want summer back!” 

Her face is impossible to read. She shifts and wipes at her eyes and takes a deep breath. “Summer is gone, Finn.”

What she means is everything is gone. He feels it in his bones but there’s something else there and he isn’t sure if it’s just his heart singing a love song but he thinks that maybe nothing is irreparable if they just try hard enough. 

“Doesn’t mean we have to end with it. Doesn’t mean there can’t be a new season, right?” 

She shakes her head, tears plopping out of her eyes and his stomach drops because the last time he saw her he made her cry and this isn’t a good thing but maybe some things have to be shed. “You told me we can’t be friends.” 

“You told me we couldn’t be together.” 

They’re slipping down that steep slope of blame and Finn knows if they reach the bottom, they’ll never manage to get back out. His parents never did and Finn can’t stand the thought of Rae flitting out of his life the way his Mum has. So he digs his heels in and grabs hold of the first thing his mouth stumbles across. “I should have told you why I liked you. ‘Because’ was a shit reason. I like you because you’re Rae. Because you’re a great friend and a great person and you make me weak in a way I don’t even get. I like everything about you, girl. Why can’t you see that?” 

“Because I don’t like me, Finn. I don’t. I’m working on it but…” she looks upwards as if she’s hoping the sky will give her an answer or just fall down and crush the both of them. “Finn, I can’t look at myself naked and the thought of you seeing me naked makes me want to peel out of my skin.” 

He figured this. A little time alone, a little Mama Cass singing in his ear, and he had realized it had less to do with him and more to do with how she saw herself. _You’re an 11, I’m a 4._ But to him she was off the chart, above all of the noise and chatter of regular teenagers. He wasn’t going to convince her of anything, not tonight. Probably not tomorrow. Maybe with time but only if she trusted him. “All you had to do is say no, Rae. I’m not rushing. I just want to hold your hand, girl.” 

His heart is pounding as he holds out his hand because he’s out on a limb here with no safety net and the wrong move will shatter him from the inside out. 

“There are a lot of things we need to talk about.” 

“I’m ready when you are,” he wiggles his fingers, his eyes pleading. “Only when you are.” 

She’s hesitant when she takes his hand and she whispers, “I think I’m ready now.” 

He listens and she talks. About her time in the hospital and how she really feels and Tix. And he lets her be the one to lean over and kiss him and when she pulls away, he’s ok with it because they’ve got time. Summer only dies if you let it. 

(He skips school the next day and rides out to Chop’s work. The two boys shuffle awkwardly in front of each other until Finn says, “Pub tonight, then?” and Chop replies, “First round’s on you.”)


End file.
